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A poetic work exploring the relationship between earth and sky at twilight, through light and colour.
Artist: Allan Giddy
Curator: Michael Goldberg
Curator: Michael Goldberg
Artwork description
Earth v Sky is a dynamic artwork by Allan Giddy located in Bicentennial Park, Glebe. Each evening, as dusk falls, 2 magnificent Moreton Bay fig trees are bathed in coloured light that changes in response to the sky during sunset.
While darkness descends, digital technology repeatedly samples the colour of the sunset and calculates the reverse colour, which is projected onto the trees. This colour and its contrast with the sky become increasingly noticeable and passersby can watch the trees respond to the subtly changing and darkening sky in real time, until sunset is complete (around 1 hour and 15 minutes each day).
Earth v Sky is a poetic environmental artwork which connects the heavens and earth. It is sustainably powered – originally by the wind, using a wind turbine installed nearby to provide the power to offset the artwork. It is now powered by solar energy. The turbine remains in place as a salute to the wind’s mediation between the realms of earth and sky.
“Lights bathe the trees in their own ever-changing ‘opposite twilight’ each day after sunset. To achieve this, a world-first, custom-built, colour-sensitive system continuously samples, and then inverts, the colour of the evening sky. As the earth seeks to balance the sky through colour opposition, the turbine symbolises balancing the electricity used to create it.”
– Allan Giddy, 2012
Artist
Allan Giddy is a pioneer of alternative energy systems and light in time-based sculpture. He is the director of the Environmental Research Initiative for Art (ERIA) at UNSW Art & Design, an organisation aimed at reinvigorating decaying public spaces through the installation of ‘active’ artwork.
A world-first, colour-sensitive light controller was developed by the artist with the assistance of Mr Snow from the House of Laudanum.
Glebe Point Road public art program
The Glebe Point Road public art program was a result of local feedback from members of the Glebe community in June 2006 as part of our streetscape improvement program.
Local resident action and community groups proposed the project including public art, in their submission to the City of Sydney's priority projects for Glebe in 2006–2010.
We developed a staged and integrated public art program with members of the community, including workshops, a temporary community art project and permanent works, in partnership with Glebe Youth Services.
The 3 projects selected to be part of the Glebe Point Road public art program were Allan Giddy’s Earth v Sky, Nuha Saad’s Skippedy Skip and Dr Nigel Helyer’s Wireless House.
